The Blackwater Lightship Book + PRICE WATCH * Amazon pricing is not included in price watch

The Blackwater Lightship Book

Set in Ireland in the 1990s, the The Blackwater Lightship tells the story of the Devereux family. Helen doesn't get on with her mother Lily, and Lily doesn't get on with her mother Dora. Three generations of women, tetchy with recriminations and memory, are forced together when they discover that Helen's younger brother, Declan, is dying from an AIDS-related illness: "It was like a dark shadow in a dream, and then it became real and sharp." This novel is an intense examination of Colm Toibin's signature themes: death, loss, illness and morality. However, if the themes are a continuance from his previous books, the style is a distinct departure from the lyrical prose of The Story of the Night and The Heather Blazing. In The Blackwater Lightship Toibin strips his style down to spare sentences, and what is said is bleaker: "It was clear to her now that it did not matter whether there were people or not--the world would go on. Imaginings and resonances and pains and small longings, they meant nothing against the hardness of the sea." It is almost as if he is writing us and himself, as the novelist, out of the picture. The familiar poetry of landscape: "the sudden rise in the road and then the first view of the sea glinting in the slanted summer light", is all that is left. There is not much plot, the book concentrates on the gradual unfolding of talk between the Devereux clan, and two friends of Declan's, who have fine lines of catty commentary. Dora asks: "Is there a need to rake over everything?" But words, even bitter ones, are shaky constants, when everything else is crumbling. This puts a lot of pressure on the prose; when it works well it's charged with suppressed emotion, strangely lulling in its determination to be quiet and ordinary. But sometimes its simplicity makes the book a little static, threatening to becalm the reader. The Blackwater Lightship is a book about the frailty of human experiences, in the face of indifferent nature: "soon they would only be a memory, and that too would fade with time." Toibin deals with the tricky balance between hopefulness and hopelessness with elegant economy, and very few stumbles. --Eithne Farry Read More

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  • Amazon

    In Blackwater in the early 1990s, three women - Dora Devereux, her daughter Lily and her granddaughter Helen - have come together after years of strife and reached an uneasy truce. Helen's adored brother Declan is dying. Two friends join him and the women in an old house, where the six of them must listen and come to terms with one another.

  • Play

    It is Ireland in the early 1990's. Three women - Dora Devereux her daughter Lily and her granddaughter Helen - have arrived after years of strife at and uneasy peace. For Helen's adored brother Declan is dying and the three of them join him in the grandmother's crumbling old house by the sea with two of his friends. These six from different generations and with different beliefs are forced to listen to each other and come to terms with each other. "We shall be reading and living with "The Blackwater Lightship" in twenty years." - "Independent on Sunday". "I know of no novelist under fifty who is Toibin's equal. And in this his fourth book his prose rises to heights of an extraordinary beauty." - Paul Binding "Independent on Sunday". "It is in his emotional choreography that Toibin shows himself to be an exceptional writer. Helen is estranged from both her mother and grandmother... Toibin helps them make peace - and he does it beautifully." - David Robson "Sunday Telegraph". "This is the most astonishing piece of writing lyrical in its emotion and spare in its construction... Toibin has crafted an unmissable read." - Julia Neuberger "Glasglow Sunday Herald.""He writes in spare powerful prose and he is truly perceptive about family relationships which at times makes reading his stories incredibly painful. But this is a beautiful novel." - Nuala McCann "Belfast News".

  • Blackwell

    This is the most astonishing piece of writing, lyrical in its emotion and spare in its construction ... Toibin has crafted an unmissable read' Sunday Herald 'This is the most astonishing piece of writing, lyrical in its emotion and spare in its...

  • BookDepository

    The Blackwater Lightship : Paperback : Pan Macmillan : 9780330389860 : 0330389866 : 07 Mar 2008 : A story of resolution, compassion and love, The Blackwater Lightship reveals the intense connection between grandmother, mother and daughter.

  • ASDA

    Shortlisted for the 1999 Booker Prize this is an extraordinary novel from one of Ireland's most gifted writers.

  • 0330389866
  • 9780330389860
  • Colm Toibin
  • 7 March 2008
  • Picador
  • Paperback (Book)
  • 272
  • 5
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